[caption id="attachment_4434" align="alignleft" width="225" caption="Christmas illumination"]
[/caption]Carol Forsloff - For
many people the holiday season is a joyous occasion, while for others
it's a time when depression sets in for things that are lost, for people
who are gone and for the way things used to be, but a therapist gives ideas on how to cope with these feelings.
Stephanie Wick, a Kansas State University instructor in family studies and human
services and a licensed marriage and family therapist, tells us all
these feelings are exacerbated by longer nights, cold weather and having
to be inside much of the time.
"When you've lost a
loved one and you're coming up on the holiday season, there's a giant
void," Wick said. "It's a reminder that all these other families are
celebrating this time together and enjoying their time together, but
we've lost this person. We can't enjoy this time because we're not
complete, we're not whole."
So what should people do to
help those who are grieving during this time? Wick says there are ways
to cope, but people need to remember that each person goes through
grief in a different way.
"I think one of the most
important things to do as an outsider watching a person who is grieving
is to respect their healing process," Wick said. "If they decide they
don't want to put up a Christmas tree, have a meal or open presents, as
an outsider it's important to respect that because it's necessary for
that person or that family's process of trying to get through this
holiday season."
Friends and family can help by
listening, letting the person talk or share about memories. Recognize
that resuming old holiday traditions at the time of loss can be
difficult. So Wick recommends creating new traditions instead of
reliving old ones during the grieving process.
Families can
do something they haven't done before or go somewhere else for the
holidays," Wick tells us. "It's a way of marking the new phase, but also
preserving the old traditions and the memory of those traditions with
the person who has died."
It's important to remember that the grieving process takes time, Wick said.
"It
gets easier with time," she said. "The first holiday is the hardest.
For many people it's a process of surviving, just getting through one
holiday at a time."
